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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/23545096">Ice Gray Thaw</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/WretchedArtifact/pseuds/WretchedArtifact'>WretchedArtifact</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Yuri!!! on Ice (Anime)</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>M/M, Pining, Post-Canon, Pre-Slash, Slice of Life, Touch-Starved</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-04-08</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-04-08</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-02 16:21:27</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Teen And Up Audiences</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>No Archive Warnings Apply</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>3,859</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/23545096</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/WretchedArtifact/pseuds/WretchedArtifact</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>It was easy for Yuri to be mad at Victor and Yuuri when they lived thousands of kilometers away in Japan.  </p><p>But when Victor and Yuuri move to St. Petersburg, training with him every day at the same rink, Yuri is faced with the uncomfortable realization that he might actually...<i>like</i> them.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Katsuki Yuuri &amp; Victor Nikiforov &amp; Yuri Plisetsky, Katsuki Yuuri/Victor Nikiforov/Yuri Plisetsky</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>16</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>264</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Collections:</b></td><td>Robot Rainbow 2020</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>Ice Gray Thaw</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><ul class="associations">
      <li>For <a href="https://archiveofourown.org/users/pleurer/gifts">pleurer</a>.</li>



    </ul></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>It started in an airport.</p><p>Reality sort of broke down in airports. After five hours of waiting for a delayed plane, Yuri was willing to accept things he would never accept in regular life. On the way home from the Worlds, waiting endlessly in the crowded terminal, Yuri started to nod off, his head dipping forward on his chest. When he pitched forward a little too far, he jerked back on instinct, groggy and startled.</p><p>Next to him, Yuuri looked up from his phone. “You can lean on me, if you want,” he offered.</p><p>Six months ago, Yuri would’ve recoiled at the very idea. In the months leading up to Yuri’s Senior debut, Yuuri had functioned like the boss enemy in a video game: every choice Yuri made was motivated by the desire to get strong enough to trounce him in competition. But it had been harder to think of him like that since Victor and Yuuri moved to St. Petersburg. In fact, present-day Yuri was so tired that he couldn’t remember why he’d been so pissed at Yuuri in the first place.</p><p>So he blearily considered his options. He was crammed in a seat between Yuuri and Yakov, and all the other seats in the terminal were packed full with stranded travelers. He could either lean against Yuuri, lean against Yakov, or slither out of his seat and fall asleep on the cold airport floor.</p><p>He leaned against Yuuri. He did it gingerly, at first, but Yuuri shifted and put his arm around Yuri’s back, pulling him in closer. Yuri had the drowsy sense that being so close to Yuuri ought to be weird enough to wake him back up, but it didn’t. Yuri let his heavy head settle down on Yuuri’s shoulder and was asleep within seconds.</p><p>Forty minutes later, Yuri woke to the sound of cheers in the terminal. Their plane had finally arrived. He lifted his head up, and Yuuri smiled at him. “Are you ready to go?” Yuuri asked.</p><p>The edge of Yuri’s mouth was sticky. Oh, fuck, he had <em>drooled </em>on him. But Yuuri didn’t seem grossed out. He still had his arm around Yuri’s back, firm and secure, and everywhere their bodies were pressed together felt warm: a soft, mellow warmth that was at odds with the cramped seat and awkward angle.</p><p>“Yeah,” Yuri said gruffly. “Thanks.”</p><p>On the plane, Victor and Yuuri stopped in business class, and Yuri trudged onward to the back. He slept a little more during the flight, but despite the pillow and blanket he used, he woke up feeling cold and stiff.</p><p> </p>
<hr/><p> </p><p>The problem with living with two divorced coaches was that the weight of years hid behind every one of their sentences. When Yakov and Lilia got angry with each other, it never seemed to be for a reason Yuri could discern, and when they got along, they were impossible to understand, making constant references to people and events that Yuri had never heard of. “Oh, they were like that even before they got divorced,” Victor said. Victor had lived with them when he was younger, too. “You know, if they ever get to be too much, you can always come stay with me and Yuuri for a night or two.”</p><p>Six months ago, Yuri would’ve balked at the idea that he needed favors from Victor and Yuuri. But one evening, when there were obvious stormclouds gathering in Lilia’s apartment, he tossed together an overnight bag and showed up on Victor and Yuuri’s doorstep, his ears burning red from embarrassment. “Yurio!” Victor exclaimed when he opened the door. “Are there fireworks over at Lilia’s right now? She and Yakov were both in terrible moods at the rink today.”</p><p>It should’ve felt weird, to hang out at Victor and Yuuri’s place after being furious with them for so long. It should’ve felt weird to eat with them around their kitchen table and leave his toothbrush in their bathroom. But neither of them acted like it was weird. And being around them at home didn’t feel that much different than being around them at the rink. They still endlessly talked about skating minutiae and argued over the most minor of choreography choices.</p><p>So Yuri started coming over more and more: not just when Yakov and Lilia were fighting, but when Victor mentioned he was making something interesting for dinner, or when Yuuri bought a new video game he said Yuri would like. It wasn’t a big deal; it was just kind of ordinary, and nice.</p><p>Then something happened that none of them expected. The stormclouds that had hung heavy over Lilia’s apartment quietly dissipated and didn’t return. She and Yakov started sniping at each other less and laughing together more. And one day, when Yuri came home to the apartment, he went down the hall past the master bedroom and heard something he never wanted to hear again: the vocal, thumping, unmistakable sound of his two seventy-something coaches having sex.</p><p>Yuri packed a bag in thirty seconds flat and fled to Victor and Yuuri’s apartment, traumatized. “Oh, this is so exciting!” Victor said, which was <em>not</em> the reaction Yuri had been expecting. “I was so disappointed when they first got divorced. You could tell they still loved each other, but they were just too stubborn to compromise on anything.”</p><p>“I can’t live there anymore,” Yuri said, burying his head in his arms on the kitchen table. “Not if they’re going to be doing <em>that</em> all the time. They’re older than my fucking <em>grandparents.</em>”</p><p>“Maybe this would be a good time to ask about getting your own apartment,” Yuuri suggested.</p><p>“Oh, yes!” Victor exclaimed. “There’s nothing wrong with capitalizing on their good mood.”</p><p>Yuri had asked Lilia if he could move out at the end of last season, but she had flatly refused him. “Having one strong season doesn’t mean you can afford to become lenient with yourself,” she said. “Your habits were terrible back when you lived in the dorms. I don’t trust you not to regress the instant you’re alone.”</p><p>But now, less than half a year later, she and Yakov were suddenly, miraculously amenable to the idea of Yuri finding his own place. “I trust you to value your skating more than whatever bad habits you might be tempted to indulge,” Lilia said magnanimously, and Yuri had to tamp down the overwhelming urge to call that out as bullshit. But it didn’t really matter what the reason was—he was finally, <em>finally</em> going to get a place of his own. Yuri had no idea where to start looking for apartments, but it turned out he didn’t need to worry: about ten seconds after learning Yuri had gotten permission to leave, Victor started inundating Yuri’s phone with links to apartment listings and reams of copious advice. “Where the fuck does he get the <em>energy?</em>” Yuri asked Yuuri the next day, as the two of them ate lunch at the rink. “He’s coaching you, training for the Olympics, and now he’s my fucking realtor?”</p><p>Yuuri looked out at the ice, where Victor was in the middle of his practice with Yakov. “He likes being helpful,” Yuuri said, fondness in his eyes.</p><p>“I didn’t even <em>ask</em>.”</p><p>Yuuri huffed a laugh. “Since when has that ever stopped him?”</p><p>Within two weeks, Yuri found a place he liked: it was fifteen minutes away from the rink and only a couple of streets down from Victor and Yuuri’s building. It wasn’t furnished, and Yuri didn’t own any furniture, but Victor was on top of that, too: he immediately started inundating Yuri’s phone with links to tasteful, well-designed furniture. After the fourth link to some modernist couch that only came in shades of charcoal or ivory, Yuri messaged him back: <em>What the fuck is all this boring-ass shit?</em></p><p><em>Oh, good point, </em>Victor wrote, and ten minutes later he sent over another link. It was a full-sized couch upholstered in entirely in leopard print.</p><p>Yuri bought it. It looked fucking rad in his new living room.</p><p> </p>
<hr/><p> </p><p>Everyone always said not to read your own press, but sometimes Yuri couldn’t help himself. As the Olympics drew closer, all the skating fans online were starting to speculate about what the Men’s podium would look like, and Yuri kept going back to read their thoughts the same way he’d compulsively pick at a scab. There were excited discussions about the epic rivalry that was currently brewing under the roof of the Sports Champions Club: Victor, the long-reigning champion, was suddenly at risk of being usurped by either the new heir apparent in Russian figure skating, or his very own fiancé. People posted all kinds of unsourced rumors about the tensions that were going on between the three of them, the fighting and back-biting and jealousy that were unavoidably permeating the rink.</p><p>And they <em>did</em> fight, sometimes, but it was always for the dumbest, pettiest reasons. There was one particular bench in the rink lobby that Yuri liked better than all the others, because it was tucked into an alcove near the vending machines, right where they vented their heat out the back. Yuri had discovered years ago that when he sat there, no one else in the lobby could see him, but he could still watch the big TV mounted on the opposite wall. It was perfect: a pocket of warm air where he could camp out if he got to practice early, or where he could linger if he didn't want to head out into the freezing winter weather as soon as practice was over.</p><p>The bench was also only long enough to fit about a person and a half, which turned out to be a problem when Yuuri eventually discovered it. Yuri went to sit down one day after his morning practice and found Yuuri already huddled there, practically hugging the corner of one of the vending machines. “Ugh,” Yuri said, annoyed. “What are you doing here?”</p><p>“I followed the heat,” Yuuri said. He had clearly just arrived at the rink: he was still wearing his gloves and coat. “It's <em>so cold</em> outside.”</p><p>St. Petersburg was in the middle of a particularly vicious cold snap, and Yuuri was not adjusting well to it at all. Yuri felt a little sympathy, but not enough to stop him from saying, “Well, move. That's my spot.”</p><p>“I'll die,” Yuuri said hollowly, pressing himself closer to the vending machine. He didn't even bother to challenge Yuri on the idea that a random bench in the rink lobby could be someone's <em>spot</em>.</p><p>“You fucking wimp,” Yuri said. “Don't you have practice now, anyway?”</p><p>“Not for another half-hour.”</p><p><em>Ugh.</em> Technically, since Yuri was done with practice, there was nothing stopping him from just going home and basking in his warm apartment. But he didn’t really want to walk out there in the cold, either. And he sure as hell wasn’t going to let Yuuri steal the best spot in the lobby from him.</p><p>Yuri jammed himself down on the bench next to Yuuri and hip-checked Yuuri sideways. Yuuri slid over on startled instinct, his cheek squashing momentarily against the vending machine, and then with no shame at all he swayed back and threw his arms around Yuri, pushing his ice-cold face directly against Yuri’s neck.</p><p>“Ugh, what the <em>fuck!</em><em>”</em> Yuri said, trying to wriggle away. The bench was so small and Yuuri’s grip was so tight that there wasn’t anywhere for Yuri to escape to. “I’m not your fucking space heater!”</p><p>“Then why did you sit here?” Yuuri asked, turning his head to press his other icy cheek against Yuri’s neck.</p><p>Yuri tried one last time to wriggle away, but it was pointless: heat-seeking Yuuri had surprising strength. “Ugh, you fucking asshole,” Yuri grumbled, slumping. “Stealing my favorite spot <em>and </em>my body heat.”</p><p>Yuuri didn’t even try to defend himself: he just held onto Yuri as his cheek slowly warmed to match the temperature of Yuri’s skin. It was a very strange feeling, having Yuuri’s heavy weight against him, feeling Yuuri’s jaw and cheek against the sensitive skin of his throat. Yuri rarely hugged anyone other than his grandpa, and in the seven years he’d lived in St. Petersburg, he’d gotten used to being a solitary figure, all alone with himself on the ice. Pressure and touch felt slightly confusing—like they were meant for someone else, not for him.</p><p>Yuri looked down to where the folds of Yuuri’s coat were wedged against his side. He pinched the material between his thumb and forefinger; it seemed way too thin for the weather outside. “Why hasn’t your dumbass boyfriend gotten you a better coat yet?” Yuri said. “No wonder you’re fucking freezing.”</p><p>“I told him this one would be fine,” Yuuri said. “I wore it during the winter in America.”</p><p>“Well, we’re not <em>in</em> America, idiot,” Yuri said. “How am I supposed to trounce you at the Olympics if you freeze to death walking to practice?”</p><p>Yuuri eased his hold on Yuri and lifted up his head. His formerly pale face was now annoyingly rosy with stolen heat. “You’re right,” Yuuri conceded. “I’ll ask Victor to help me pick out a better one this evening.” He smiled a little. “You know, Yurio, sometimes you can be very nice.”</p><p>Yuri’s pride was so offended that he shoved Yuuri off the bench.</p><p> </p>
<hr/><p> </p><p>Victor and Yuuri had to split up when it was time for Nationals. The two of them were always so wrapped up in each other that they seemed weirdly incomplete when they were apart. Victor in particular acted different when Yuuri wasn’t around: he was either too quiet or too loud, and he sometimes slipped into a bright, false cheerfulness that grated on Yuri’s nerves. When video was released of the public practice sessions at All-Japan, Yuuri took the ice looking alternately stone-faced and jittery, and his form was ten times sloppier than it had been before he left. Yuri wished he could reach through his phone screen and smack some sense back onto Yuuri’s tense, unhappy face.</p><p>Russian Nationals were being held in Moscow that year, and Yuri’s grandfather came to cheer Yuri on and smuggle him some precious contraband: two separate sacks of homemade pirozhki. “Regular and katsudon, your favorites,” Grandpa said proudly, and watched with satisfaction as Yuri ate one of each in quick succession. They were both so good that Yuri found it very easy to ignore the voices of Yakov and Lilia yelling at him in his head.</p><p>Yuuri’s short program performance at All-Japan fell in the late morning, Moscow time, and a few minutes before it started Yuri picked up the sack of katsudon pirozhki and walked down the hall to Victor’s hotel room. He knocked on the door. There was a too-long silence, like maybe Victor was asleep, but Yuri knew that was bullshit. He banged harder. “Let me in, asshole,” he said.</p><p>He heard faint shifting, and then Victor opened the hotel door. He was messy-haired and wan, with a slight red tinge to his eyes. For a second, something inside Yuri quailed: he had seen Victor look disheveled plenty of times, but he’d never seen him look this flatly and unmistakably <em>sad </em>before. “I didn’t bring my laptop with me,” Yuri said gruffly, and elbowed his way into the room.</p><p>Victor had already set up his own laptop at the foot of his hotel bed, and a low murmur of Japanese commentary was coming from the running livestream. The large bed was neatly made, and the curtains were shut, and the whole room seemed so sterile and dark that it depressed Yuri just to walk inside. He pushed the sack of katsudon pirozhki into Victor’s hands and went to shove one of the curtains open. Victor blinked in the sudden light, then looked down at the contents of the bag. He sniffed it, and a faint smile appeared on his face. “Did your grandpa make these?” Victor asked.</p><p>“They’re fucking amazing,” Yuri said. “Way better than the ones I make.”</p><p>Yuri planted himself down on Victor’s bed without asking permission, and after a moment Victor came to sit down next to him. Victor folded the bag of katsudon pirozhki shut and laid it down in front of the laptop carefully, almost like it was an offering. “I can’t eat it until after,” he explained. “It would be bad luck.”</p><p>Yuri rolled his eyes, but he couldn’t argue with superstition. The two of them settled in to wait for Yuuri’s turn on the ice, and while Victor was still quiet and unsmiling, at least the sunlight coming in through the window made the room feel a little less dour. In the sidelong illumination of the light, Yuri noticed faint wrinkles had appeared on Victor’s face: fine lines across his forehead, tiny creases at the corners of his eyes. He wondered if they were always there, or if they only looked that prominent because Victor was upset.</p><p>When warm-ups started and Yuuri first appeared on the screen, Victor tensed and leaned in towards the laptop, looking closely at Yuuri’s face. Yuuri’s expression was forcefully resolute. “He’s nervous,” Victor said.</p><p>“He’s always nervous,” Yuri said, but he felt his own shoulders start to tense up a little, too.</p><p>There were six skaters that went before Yuuri, and none of them came anywhere near Yuuri’s level. But the sight of their mediocre skating didn’t seem to make Victor feel any better. His posture tightened, and tightened, until finally they heard the familiar name separate out from the rush of Japanese commentary: <em>Katsuki Yuuri</em>.</p><p>Yuuri skated out to center ice, waving to the cheering crowd. His movements were strong and a little over-fast, and when the camera switched to a close-up, his face held the same expression as before: a forceful resolve that Victor and Yuri both knew wasn’t real. When Yuuri settled into the opening pose for his program, Victor lifted his tightly closed fist to his mouth and kissed his engagement ring; half a second later, the image of Yuuri lifted his closed fist in the same gesture and brushed his lips over the matching band.</p><p>It sent something unexpectedly sharp through Yuri’s chest. It was easy, most days, not to care about how wrapped up Victor and Yuuri were with each other; all their little displays of romance had mostly become background noise to Yuri. But there was something about Victor’s red-rimmed eyes, and Yuuri’s false mask of confidence, that made Yuri feel like he’d just seen something he wasn’t supposed to see. You weren’t supposed to <em>need</em> someone else that much: so much that when you were apart, you turned into a different person. What good were you if you couldn’t be by yourself without crumbling?</p><p>On the screen, the music started, and Yuuri swept his arms up in the familiar opening gesture that Yuri had seen him practice a thousand times. “Okay,” Victor said, shifting nervously on the bed. “He’s starting confident. Good poise.”</p><p>“He looks better than he did at the practice session,” Yuri said.</p><p>Yuuri wobbled the landing of his first jump—Victor hid his face in his hands for a full five seconds, like a child—but as the song went on, Yuuri’s normal steadiness seemed to return to him. At the halfway mark of the song, the tension started to leave Yuri’s shoulders: even if Yuuri torpedoed the second half, he’d already racked up a solid buffer of points. But Yuuri didn’t torpedo it. It wasn’t an Olympic-quality program, but it was still very good, and when the camera went to a close-up at the end, Yuuri’s expression was tired and relieved.</p><p>Victor slumped forward on the bed, covering his face with his hands. “Okay,” he said, letting out a deep sigh. “That was good. That was fine.” He extended a hand toward Yuri. “Pirozhki?”</p><p>Yuri opened the bag and gave him one. Victor made a gratifyingly pleased noise when he took the first bite. “Oh, that’s really good,” Victor said, closing his eyes as he chewed. “I think we deserve these more than he does, after what he put us through.”</p><p>“I’m going to tell him you said that,” Yuri said, reaching into the bag and fishing one out for himself. He only got it halfway to his mouth before a sudden weight knocked him askew: Victor had collapsed against his side in a messy, poky-elbowed side hug.</p><p>“Thank you for watching it with me,” Victor said, squeezing him. “It would’ve been so much worse without you here.”</p><p>“Ugh,” Yuri said instinctively, but he gave Victor a half-hearted squeeze back.</p><p> </p>
<hr/><p> </p><p>When the two of them returned home from Russian Nationals—Yuri with a hugely smug gold medal, and Victor with a silver that he cheerfully claimed to be fine with—Yuuri had already gotten back and messaged Yuri that he was going to make celebratory katsudon that evening. Yuri agreed to meet up with him and Victor for dinner, but first he went to his apartment to drop off his luggage and reunite with Potya.</p><p>It was always strange, coming home to his quiet apartment after the stress and bustle of a competition. Yuri had spent the last week constantly surrounded by people: in airport terminals, at restaurants, at the rink, in press conferences. The silence in his apartment felt almost exotic in comparison. Potya jumped purring into his lap when he sat down on his leopard-print couch, and Yuri stroked her back and rubbed her head until she reached that inevitable point where she got tired of his attention. She hopped down and went over to her cat tree to take a nap.</p><p>Yuri sat there in the quiet, looking at his apartment. It still wasn’t as completely furnished as it should be: once he had gotten his basic needs covered, he kind of lost interest in the rest. He knew that he only had to bring the topic up, and Victor would send him a twenty-page list of everything he was missing. He was pretty sure that list was already written, actually. The last time he’d had Victor and Yuuri over, he found a set of kitchen knives in a drawer the next day that he was positive hadn’t been there before.</p><p>Yuri picked up his phone, but nothing much had changed on social media since the last time he looked. He set it back down again. His suitcases were over by the front door, waiting to be unpacked, but the thought of doing laundry and putting away all his shit didn’t sound appealing in the slightest. He looked at his television, his PS4, the stack of games and movies on the shelf next to it.</p><p>He picked up his phone again and messaged Yuuri.</p><p>
  <em>Can I come over early?</em>
</p><p>Yuuri answered, a few seconds later:</p><p>
  <em>Of course, you can help us cook!</em>
</p><p>Yuri leapt up off the couch and grabbed his jacket. He knew you weren’t supposed to need anyone so much that it changed you. But <em>wanting</em> someone, sometimes, on a few rare occasions, just a little bit—</p><p>—that had to be okay, right?</p>
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